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Bill Richardson, Al Gore and Jesse Jackson have all taken a role in trying to bring home two U.S. journalists jailed in North Korea.
AP photo composite by POLITICO

In the opaque, dangerous days after North Korea sentenced two American journalists to 12 years’ hard labor, the White House faced the challenge of fashioning a response that doesn’t raise the tension level with the volatile hermit nation with a burgeoning nuclear weapons program.

But that wasn’t all: The Obama administration also had to get Gov. Bill Richardson off television.

At a time when North Korea’s uncertain leadership and bracingly bellicose threat to the stability of the region have put Pyongyang high on the radar of the new administration, the interest and expertise of Richardson, former Vice President Al Gore and even the Rev. Jesse Jackson have created the need for diplomacy first on this side of the Pacific. Diplomacy, that is, and the sound of silence.

The New Mexico governor, who negotiated the return of Americans from North Korea in the 1990s, was a ubiquitous presence in the early days of the crisis, but on Monday, he abruptly went dark and is now refusing all media requests, Caitlin Kelleher, a spokeswoman, said.

His silence, people following the situation closely said, is part of a broader administration strategy to handle the delicate situation with immense care and as low a public profile as possible.

“Everyone understands that it’s a very sensitive diplomatic situation and the need to proceed cautiously as we move forward and attempt to secure the release of the two journalists,” said Fred Jones, a spokesman for Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.), who has not commented on the situation.

Of all the countries competing for the new president’s attention, none has been more aggressive — or more unpredictable — than North Korea. The country’s leader, Kim Jong Il, launched a long-range missile just hours before President Barack Obama delivered a landmark nonproliferation speech. He carried out an underground nuclear test just last month.

But the imprisonment of the two journalists has taken the provocations to a new, more personal level — posing real dangers for an administration that had been seeking productive, midlevel talks with North Korea.

The women risk being made pawns in negotiations over North Korea’s nuclear program, something the White House is eager to avoid. The stakes — the lives of two American citizens — are painfully clear, and the sister of one, former CNN reporter Lisa Ling, is no stranger to the White House, having been a prominent campaign supporter.

The two are also being held in a country whose leadership structure remains opaque to outsiders and whose leader has grown increasingly unpredictable and is “not operating according to the old playbook,” said a North Korea expert at American University, Peter Beck.

Making the situation more complicated at home, two major American figures have also taken high-profile roles. Richardson, long an international troubleshooter, inserted himself as a ubiquitous television figure, saying he stood “ready to do anything” Obama asked.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson on Wednesday pronounced himself “willing” to travel to Pyongyang, as well.

Gore, meanwhile, did not choose his role: The two reporters, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, are employees of his Current TV.

When I looked at the picture of the three men before reading the headline, I thought it was an ad for the new three stooges movie. Unfortunately for the two women involved, it is not an ad for the movie.

The question of military action is a North Asian regional concern. The US can 'theoretically' engage NK. But then you not only run the risk of killing potentially millions of people and destabilizing an entire region. The economic and political fallout could literally devistate the world economy. The potential to spread conflict is great..

So you may want to jump in there and "show them who is boss" but you better run the calculus of its consequences.

It is hilarious how all you wing nuts parrot your hatemonger cult leaders talking points on Korea......

Under Bush N.Korea went from a nation who submitted to having there bomb making plutonium under 24 hr international observance........To becoming a nation armed with nukes.........And you carried the water and made excuses for the little shrub....

Now Obama has to deal with the mess W left him....and you blame Barack........LOL......

Nothing! He's quite chaming holding that Asian tiger by the tail. Why doesn't he just wave his bloody hands and bring it to and end...should just be as easy as calming the stormy seas and stopping them from rising. But NK could be above his pay grade...ya know.

Man I'm getting to like this minority seat...if's really side-slapping fun to play fiberal and kibitz every move the POTUS makes and throw stones and step back and watch the roiling of the waters...just like the leftoids did for 8 years. Hey, it's patriotic to oppose and gripe...remember?

what's with the term wingnuts? can someone explain to me what it is, why it's thrown around like bigot and racist, and why it doesn't apply to left-wingers?

My assumption is that it means one who is overly zealous about a certain wing of political ideology.

in that case, there are just as many left wingnuts as righties. you people act as if the right is blindly following a collectivist political ideology and you are not, when in fact, both lanes of the road go in the same direction.